Improvise Adapt Overcome
by Quirky Individual
Summary: Once upon a time, before quirks existed, humans survived by adapting to their everyday situations. Nowadays theres a quirk for every situation but sometime all you need to do is adapt.
1. An adaption is all it takes

Chapter 1: An adaption is all it takes

Once upon a time, way before quirks existed, the only way for humans to survive in the face of any problems that may have come our way was to adapt to them. Whether it was making tools to assist us in hunting, harnessing better materials for these items or even by simply changing an approach towards the problem itself when faced with it. Nowadays you could argue that quirks themselves are an adaptation to some form of issue we encountered down the line but whose to say? Anyway, sometimes the flashiest of quirks aren't the best for most situations, sometimes all a person needs is to simply adapt.

* * *

**NAME: IZUKU MIDORIYA**  
**AGE: 4**  
**BLOOD TYPE: O**  
**QUIRK: ****[NOT YET DIAGNOSABLE]**** QUIRKLESS**

Inko looked up to the doctor from the Medical file of her son she had just finished reading.

"Are you sure about this doctor? He doesn't have a quirk?" She said, shooting a glance at the child in question who currently had a shaky smile on his face.

"I'm sorry but there's no hope for him, look we've run a few tests in him and his results have shown that he hasn't developed either yours or your husband's quirks, I believe you said you had small object attraction and fire breathing respectively but Izuku doesn't even have a mixture of the two. Normally I may have also considered the fact that he may be a late bloomer or he received some form of mutation however in this case I just can't see that happening as your son also has the extra join in his pinky toe, which I'll refresh both of you incase you forgot, but since quirks came around the only pattern that we found for whether or not someone developed one was the missing pinky joint, this has something to do with the human body evolving to get rid of unnecessary parts and possibly an adaption caused by the development of quirks." The doctor replied, he didn't sugar coat it and didn't seem fazed by the fact that the more he talked, the more Izukus face dropped.

"Ok then, thank you anyway doctor, we'll take our leave now." Inko bowed and pulled her shell-shocked son away.

* * *

Izuku was now 5 years old, the last year hadn't been the kindest to him since he was diagnosed as quirkless. He lost all his friends, including his best friend Katsuki Bakugo. Everyone picked on him and he would return home bruised and beaten up. However, one thing that Inko was proud of was with how Izuku kept his head down and continued studying, he was way ahead of everyone else his age, learning maths, English and science at the level of a 9 year old, while having just picked up history and starting quirk studies from online high school grade courses. He kept on making those quirk analysis notebooks of his and she was proud about his mental development.

* * *

Izuku was 6 when he started truly noting something strange, his day had been going as usual, he went to school and pretended to not already know what was being taught to them while still slightly showing off his intelligence whenever it was safe to do so, hell he even got beaten up in the more merciful way, which meant that Kacchan and his followers beat him up but at least only Kacchan used his quirk.

"YOU'LL ALWAYS BE A DEKU AND I WANT YOU TO NEVER FORGET THAT, YA UNDERSTAND YOU USELESS PIECE OF SHIT?" Kacchan screamed at him in his usual angry 'Better than all of you' kind of way as he left the classroom.

Izuku sighed, picked himself and his scattered schoolwork up from the floor and made his way home, "Strange," he said as he walked down the street, "That didn't feel as bad as it usually does."  
He inspected his arms and his face shifted into a look of confusion.  
"Huh, usually whenever he beats me up, Kacchan tends to leave a few burns on my arm, and I can still smell the nitroglycerine coming off of it but it's not really hurting." He shook off the worry and just accepted that he was probably getting used to the bullying and so the pain didn't affect him as much.

With each consecutive beatdown he received from Kacchan he realised how little they started to hurt, even when he would swear they should've been getting stronger as his friend gained better control over his quirk. By the end of that very same year though, Izuku would hardly feel the pain from explosions, punches and kicks. On top of his newfound tolerance though he would also come out almost completley unharmed.

* * *

Just over a year later Izuku regained hope in his dream.

"What the fuck has been going on Deku?" Kacchan had approached him after class one day out of nowhere.

"O-oh Kacchan, I-I don't understand what you're talking about." He stuttered, then jumped in his seat as a small explosion fuelled punch hit his desk.

"DON'T PLAY DUMB WITH ME YOU PIECE OF SHIT! WHY THE FUCK HAS NOTHING BEEN AFFECTING YOU RECENTLY!? YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO BE QUIRKLESS!" Katsuki screamed back at him before taking a deep breath and uncharacteristically calming down, "Or have you been lying to me for these past 3 years?"

"N-No! I swear as far as I know I'm quirkless and haven't lied to you once!" He'd had some doubts the more he thought about it but hadn't really tested it out, _'I don't even know what to test for, but honestly? It most likely wasn't a quirk, everyone told me that I was quirkless including the doctor so why would that suddenly change out of no wher-'_

"DEKU STOP FUCKIN MUMBLING!"

"AHHH! S-S-SORRY K-K-KACCHAN I DIDN'T EVEN REALISE I WAS DOING IT!" He shouted back getting up and running off home.

"I'LL LET YOU OFF FOR NOW DEKU" Katsuki called to him as he left.

* * *

Izuku returned home, thankfully it was one of the few days of the school week that his mother let him go home by himself due to her considering him to be smarter and more mature than most people his age.

_'Ok Izuku, think carefully about what's been happening for the past 3 years, You know that something hasn't been adding up, Kacchan has pointed out that he thinks somethings happened, so you might as well test it… problem is you don't know what IT is.'_ Izuku thought to himself as he turned a corner and saw his house straight ahead in the distance.

'Thinking about it logically, I've been getting beaten up as usual for the past 3 years and yet slowly I've been coming out of the fights with less bruising, cuts and most importantly burn marks. However something pointed out to me by mum is that whenever I return with the odd injury they have healed quite quickly… although I can't say for sure that this is also related. If this were in fact a quirk, then I should try and think about what it may realistically be…'

Izuku unlocked the door and shouted into the house to let his mum know he had returned, 'HEY! I'M BACK!" Inko turned towards the door and greeted her son and after talking about his day at school (While not admitting to being beaten up again.) Izuku told her that he was going to go into his bedroom to relax a bit.

"Ok Izuku, but don't get too comfy as dinner will be ready soon."

"Sure mum I just need to… uhh… finish writing some analyses in my notebook." He replied, technically not lying as he hated doing so, especially to his mum, and he entered his bedroom.

_'So I have a few options to what this is,'_ he thought as he pulled out a fresh notebook from his All Might branded storage unit, taking an All Might branded pencil and sitting at his All Might branded desk, _'If this even is a quirk in the first place, based off of the fact that I've noticed how it works on wounds I can assume regeneration of some sort, one note against this though is the fact that I come out of it sturdier in some way,'_  
"So maybe a defence related one? But then how does the regen fit into it?" He started to mutter softly, "Hold up Izuku, think harder than that, what if its affected other parts of your life? Then it wouldn't simply be a regen or defense boosting quirk. Hell you still don't know if it actually makes you sturdier… how would you test THAT out?" he closed his eyes and thought about it for a second before looking back up and glaring at a pair of scissors he had in a pot with his other stationary. "How sure am I that this affects my bodies healing or its defence? About 70%? Don't do anything stupid Izuku…" he paused for a second, before breaking out into a huge grin, "Screw it, clearly somethings up and I'm WAY too curious to sit around and not test this thing out!" he grabbed the scissors with his right hand and turned his left hand over so the palm was facing upwards, "Ok Izuku, just gotta be kind of careful." He sliced into the palm of his hand, he noted that even though he thought he added a bit more force than necessary, it didn't go as deep as it should have and other than a very faint stinging, he didn't feel much pain at all. "Ok, so defence has infact gone up," he said as he scribbled into his notebook "Now I gotta wait to see if the regeneration is a factor or not…"  
Izuku is interrupted by a knock on his door.

"Izuku, dinners ready." His mother said from behind his door.

"Coming" he quickly replied, putting the scissors away and joining his mum for food.

* * *

An hour passed and Izuku returned to his room after they finished eating, "Moms katsudon is the greatest!" he said to himself as he sat back down at his desk. "Now, the moment of truth." He had avoided thinking about what would happen with his self-inflicted injury during dinner. As he finally looked at the palm of his hand, he started smiling. Instead of a small line of red you'd expect to see from a relatively fresh cut he found that it had already become a paler white than his own skin. "'It's become a scar? Strange, no other cut I've received up until now has scarred over but maybe it just takes a while for it to happen. In the mean time though…" his smile turned into full blown ecstatic laughter.

"Izuku! What's going on?!" Inko shouted as she burst into his room.

Izuku turned to her as tears started to well up in his eyes, "I… I have a quirk mum."


	2. Figuring it out

Inko woke up suddenly and surveyed her surroundings and looked up to see Izuku sat at the dinner table writing in his notebook.

"Izuku? What happened?" She asked him, as he noticed she was awake and went to get her some water.

"You came into my room and fainted after I told you that umm," he stopped and handed her the drink. "After I told you that I developed my quir-"

"YOU GOT YOUR QUIRK?! OH MY BABY!" Inko suddenly interrupted him and wrapped her arms around him in a body crushing embrace, "I-I'm s-so happy for you Izuku!" she said through teary eyes. "So, tell me, what is it?"

Izuku's face scrunched up a bit as he tries to think about how to tell her, "Well, I believe it's some sort of regeneration and defence increasing quirk," he brought a finger to his lips and shifted his vision downwards at nothing in particular, 2 signs his mother had grown used to seeing whenever he would go into his 'analysis mode' as she had come to call it, "What I know so far is that through repeated exposure to certain situations my body can be conditioned to grow resistant to them, meaning that when exposed to the same kind of situations I'm barely affected. Look, earlier I cut the palm of my hand but jut after dinner it scarred over,"

Izuku looked down into his left palm to show his mother the faded cut was, only to be greeted by perfectly normal looking skin with no cut or scarring to be seen.

"Huh, looks like I underestimated how quickly it heals. I could demonstrate if that's ok with you?" he asked.

"Umm, sure Izuku. I trust you so don't do anything stupid ok?"

"Don't worry, it may involve self-injury but if it works how I think it does, then this will only benefit me in the long run." He rushed into the kitchen and started looking for a suitable knife to use as an example and left his mother on the sofa, shocked.

_'When he said he developed his quirk I assumed he was going to get my quirk or Hisashi's quirk, heck, maybe even a combination like pyrokinesis instead of just telekinesis or fire breathing but it's a mutation! That in itself is rarer than being a late bloomer but if he's already gained "resistances" as he called them, then that means he's had it for a while…' _she thought as Izuku returned while wielding a sharp carving knife.

"Ok mum, don't panic at what's about to happen. I wouldn't do this if I wasn't sure it would work…"

"I trust you Izuku, you're smart and mature so I have faith in this…"

"Ok then, here goes." Just like last time, Izuku sliced into the palm of his hand and barely reacted due to the relative lack of pain. Inko noted that he had applied quite a bit of strength into the producing the cut and yet, the cut that it left behind didn't seem to match up with the amount of strength used… it couldn't be the knife's edge as she had sharpened it recently. Maybe her son DID get his quirk… not that she doubted him.

"Ok, that's over with now and as seen earlier it took more strength than necessary to make the cut and yet it didn't go as deep as it should've," Izuku muttered as he slipped back into his 'Analysis mode' then looked up to his mother, "I don't actually know when the healing is going to start, for a slightly smaller cut it took about an hour for it to turn into a scar and at some point after you fainted it healed completely… so overall I'd say it took around 2 hours to fully heal. Not practical for a fight as of yet so I guess we wait now…"

* * *

20 minutes came and went with both Izuku and Inko sitting quietly, waiting for something to happen.

"I don't feel anything so I'm not too sure if the process is happening." Izuku said

"Well… I'd rather talk than wait in silence, so I have a few questions about this quirk of yours. I may not be as analytical as either you or your father are, especially when it comes to quirks however now that I think about it there are a few things that stand out to me Izuku. First off, you already have some 'Resistances'… meaning that you didn't just develop it and you've had it for at the very least a year or two, however… and this is hypothetical, but what if you've had it since you were 4? I say this as even after you were diagnosed as quirkless I still noticed some strong changes in you that weren't exactly physical."

Izuku's eyes widened a little at his mother's statement, he'd been so caught up in the moment that he forgot that the whole reason he even tested for a quirk was that others had noticed changes over time… and then the implications of her last statement truly sunk in, "Do you think it affects more than just physical defence? What do you mean?"

Inko smiled at him, Izuku was very smart and had an incredibly analytical mind however there were some things he just didn't know, things he'd need an outside perspective for. "Izuku, after you turned 4 was when you started writing your analysis books, you're on your 6th correct?"

"Yea I just started that one."

"Ok, well if you look back at the first 2 you did when you were 4 and compare them to the ones you did between 5 and 6 years old you'll see a huge jump in quality! The drawing suddenly became more detailed, the analyses became more thorough and I believe that in your 4th book you started writing theories about what may be possible for heroes to do with their quirks. Well, I noticed that this was the point in which you really started focusing on education, even doing higher levels and still being really good at them."

Izuku's face shifted into one of shock and excitement at what his mother was insinuating, "So you think that my quirk isn't necessarily 'Resistance'?"

Inko nodded, "Yup, I think it's something more akin to your body learning or getting used to stuff quicker and much better than a regular person, but it also allows for a higher defence. All of this through being repeatedly exposed to something. Physically, you and me both know that you've been exposed to many injuries, and that built up the 'Resistances' however, you've been exposing your self to increasingly higher levels of education and practicing analysing quirks so maybe it works in the same way?" she replied.

"That could explain how I understood high level school work as easily as I did. Not that it isn't possible without a quirk, just more convenient… the only problem is that it'll be almost impossible to test that…"

At this point 35 minutes had passed and just as they were both about to stand up and stretch their legs, both Izuku and Inko looked at his hand to see the skin almost knit itself back together and become a pale scar, " HA-HA!" Izuku exclaimed, "I told you it'd work." He went and hugged his mother.

"And _I_ didn't doubt you for a second young man," Inko replied while reciprocating. "but didn't you say it took and hour to reach this stage last time?"

"I did, but this is one aspect of the 'Resistances' I assume, where each time I'm exposed to something that injures me, it takes less time to recover from it each time… But now that we think it affects me mentally as well, what else can it affect? Does it just amp up my physical defence? What about illnesses and infections? What other mental aspects are affected? There's so much to test!"

"Calm down Izuku, you'll have plenty of time to test out what' affected. For now, you have more pressing issues…"

Izuku looked up at his mum confused

Inko sighed, "You just found out you've had a quirk for years, we need to get it registered so you'll need a name for it."

"OH RIGHT! Hmm… I think I know what I'd like to call it… I'm thinking, 'Conditioned Adaptation'."


	3. Chapter 3 - Rewrite update

Hi Y'all! I know it's been a while since I uploaded an update for either one of my stories! Truth be told, I kinda forgot about and focussed on uploading mainly on AO3, sorry. In the space of the year that I did this, I wrote more on both fics... and then promptly decided to rewrite them to improve them or thrw them into different directions. This update is to inform anyone who was invested in either Improvise. Adapt. Overcome; or Grasp on Reality, that the rewrites that I've been working on will be uploaded here as separate works, with the originals being deleted within the next few days as they were basically non existant here anyway. I hope that you continue to read the rewrites once I'm done uploading them!


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